Dan's column this week reports on the recent Bicycle Friendly Communities national expert visit to communities in Lee County and the work that lies ahead to make our county more bicycle-friendly.

Having
an outsider who’s also an expert visit a community to provide insight
can be enlightening or surprising to some and validating to others.
That’s exactly what we hoped would be the case when Steve Clark from the
League of American Bicyclists came here to help our various cities,
towns and counties become Bike Friendly Communities, one of LAB’s Bike
Friendly America designations. Steve was also anxious to provide tips
and feedback for those interested in becoming a Bike Friendly Business
or University, although, unfortunately, I don’t believe anyone took him
up on that offer.

While here, Steve stayed on Sanibel and cycled to most of his destinations, including to Cape Coral,
a ride in which he came very close to being taken out by an apparently
clueless motorist while making a left turn. Based on his comments about
this near hit, he rarely encounters as many motorist-cyclist conflicts
as he did here. That’s coming from someone who visited 75 communities
last year. After Steve had been here for enough time to get the feel for
our infrastructure and traffic dynamics, he was put on the spot by a
reporter to give our area a grade, something he said he didn’t really
want to do.

But the reporter pressed on, asking him to rate our area on a
scale of 1-10 with 10 being the best. Even considering Sanibel is a
Silver-level Bike Friendly Community, we rated “3” in Steve’s opinion.
Such a low number coming from someone who is well qualified to make
such a judgment was no surprise to those who ride, run and walk our
roads and sidepaths. (Personally, I’m inclined to give us a 2.5 rating.)
But it should be a wake-up call to our decision makers. If we expect to
continue to lure visitors and new residents to our area we must improve
that number. If we want to reduce our transportation spending by
encouraging the use of bikes for transportation as much as for
recreation and exercise we must improve that number. And if we want to
keep vulnerable road users from being injured and killed at totally
unacceptable levels that are well above state and national levels we
must improve that number.

The good news coming from Steve’s visit is that most local
governments engaged him and appear to be interested in improving their
cycling environments. Cape Coral and Bonita Springs
were especially interested and their citizens and visitors will likely
benefit greatly should they truly become Bike Friendly communities.
Unfortunately, our main and overarching government entity, Lee County apparently had no interest in even meeting with Steve, other than making an appearance when Steve met with Fort Myers
officials after a ride with about 15 staff members and citizens. The
county’s disinterest is sad because a number of years ago Lee County
applied for Bike Friendly Community designation but didn’t even make
“honorable mention,” so it’s quite clear that the “3” ranking is valid
and Lee County must be part of improving that number. Let’s hope our
commissioners make up for this missed opportunity and direct their
manager and senior staff to get back to implementing the Complete
Streets policy they approved but that now appears to be on ice, as is
the case with so many promising undertakings they’ve abandoned or
gutted. Those include an excellent Sustainability Plan, significantly
beefing-up LeeTran, and its own main planning document, New Horizon
2035.

Hooters Half-Marathon
It’s almost time for one of the best half-marathons and post-race parties in Florida
to take place right in our front yard. More than 1,100 runners
participated in Hooters Half-Marathon (hootershalfmarathon.com) last
year with quite a few more volunteers joining in to enjoy the post-race
festivities. Whether running or volunteering, this is an annual event
that’s well worth the effort and early morning wake-up call. Add to that
the fact that the proceeds go to very worthy causes, Hooters
Half-Marathon is much more than just another race — it’s an experience
that helps define our community.

—
Dan Moser is a long- time bicycle/ pedestrian advocate and traffic
safety professional who cycles, runs and walks regularly for
transportation, recreation and fitness. Contact him at bikepedmoser@gmail.com or 334- 6417.

About BikeWalkLee Blog

This is the official Blog for BikeWalkLee.org. BikeWalkLee is a community coalition raising public awareness and advocating for complete streets in Lee County -- streets that are designed, built, operated and maintained for safe and convenient travel for all users: pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists, and transit riders of all ages and abilities.